


the memories you give me

by gitta



Category: The Gifted (TV 2017)
Genre: #letClaricesayfuck2k17, Adult Language, Episode Tag: s01e04 eXit strategy, F/M, Mind Manipulation, Other, but it's a big part of what she's thinking about, this is way morea bout Clarice than thunderblink, this isn't super shippy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-23 10:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12505096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gitta/pseuds/gitta
Summary: Clarice has never been this angry before. Her first emotion has always been fear. Her instinct has always been run. She’s been scared her entire life, and she isn’t going to run from this. This is unacceptable. She didn’t have her freedom in prison and, she didn’t have much of a life before prison. But she always had her mind, which was hers. This? This is wrong, and she isn’t going to accept it.





	the memories you give me

**Author's Note:**

> unbeta'd and written mostly during physics class. clarice was a little hard for me to figure out, but i tried ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

When they get back to the abandoned house, after she’s portaled Dreamer and Trader and then an entire fucking car, Clarice collapses onto a bed, and is promptly shaken awake by Caitlin. Everyone else is looking at her terrified, and she wants to roll her eyes. Instead, she assures them that she’s not going to destroy the headquarters, and that they should really be checking out Trader. 

It feels pretty goddamn typical of her life so far that, in a group of crazy powerful crazy strong mutants who literally fight the US government, she, Clarice Fong, is the one scaring everyone. She’s the one that everyone looks at with worried eyes. She can’t blame them, but she wishes, not for the first time, that her life was different. Just that....something about it was easier. It used to be that she didn’t have to worry about anyone but herself, and now she doesn’t even have that.

It’s almost weird, how quickly she turned on John. It was like one moment, this guy is nice and probably wants something, and then the next, I need to make sure that he’s alive. But she looked back on it, and maybe it wasn’t surprising. He’s been so nice to her, nicer than anyone she can remember and he doesn’t want anything in exchange. And he’s so...hot feels like he’s a teenager, which he definitely isn’t. Handsome might the best word, but it didn’t account for the drop in her stomach every time she saw him move something. 

The constant dreams aren’t helping. They’re always in the same place, but they’re far from consistent. Sometimes they have sex, and sometimes it ends before they can. Sometimes they’re just kissing, for what seems like hours. It is nothing like Clarice has actually experienced with guys, and not something that she knew she wanted. But again, maybe it’s not a surprise. None of her experience could be called tender but she knows that that’s what most people crave. 

He’s there when she wakes up from one of the dreams, sitting on the ground in front of her couch. For a minute, his face is half real concern and half dream lust, and it makes her heart beat faster. It’s clear fast that he’s not here to have sex with her. It’s...nice, how obvious it is that he has little interest in her, that his caring isn’t about wanting something from her. Her feelings have been confusing, but she’s chosen a good one to fixate on. 

“Hey, do you need something?” She asks, blinking a few times to clear both the sleep from her eyes and the dream from her mind, “What time is it? How long did I sleep?”

“A while,” He says, sitting down beside her as she sits up. It brings him close enough that she can smell him, and she can’t help but breathe deep. “It’s almost eight.”  
“Damn, that’s like...Alright, I’ll be honest, I have no idea what time it was when we got back. I lose track of time in the gunfight,” He smiles at it, like he thinks it’s funny, and she can’t help herself from smiling brightly back. It makes him frown, for some reason. “Is something wrong?”

“No, everything’s fine,” John said, “Well, no it isn’t. No hurts, I mean. Apart from Trader and, uh, the dad. But Caitlin’s looking at them. She’s worried about her husband’s knee, but they think they might be able to put the screws back in, with Lorna’s help.”

“What?” Clarice asks, looking at him like he’s crazy, “What happened to the dad’s knee? What screws? Why’d Lorna do that?”

“Sorry,” John said, looking away from her briefly, “Sorry. You’ve been asleep. Lorna took some screws he had in his knee from an injury, so they could fight some guards. He said she could.”

“Oh,” Clarice says. He looks away again, and Clarice follows his gaze again. Dreamers standing across the way, through a doorway, but very clearly watching them. She looks away like she’s guilty, when she notices they’ve seen her, but she doesn’t walk away. “I’m glad everyone got out okay. I was worried about Dreamer.”

“Why?” John asks, looking surprised. Clarice feels a little insulted at that; she’s not that cold. She’s not a stone wall, or something. She’s just closed off. She can not want others to get hurt. She just doesn’t love anyone. That’s different from love. Love is bigger than just not wanting other people to die. 

“Well, she’s not exactly good in a fight,” Clarice says, maybe a little defensive. “I mean, at least I don’t think she is. I don’t know what her abilities are, actually.” That’s a lie, but Clarice doesn’t know how that’s possible. She has no idea what Dreamer can do, but thinking of it reminds her of when she made the portal big enough to bring the whole car in. Dreamer had run up to her, worried and telling her that she needed to make a portal, “I don’t think she has an offensive power, right? She wasn’t doing anything,”

“Her powers are focused on other things,” John says. He looks over to where she’s standing, and Clarice remembers when Dreamer explained their relationship. It had been so casual from the other woman, but Clarice knows what it was. It was a explanation of possession. Dreamer probably hadn’t been thinking of her as some kind of rival, but she had still needed to make sure that Clarice knew that John and her had a thing. Clarice had already known, and hadn’t cared, really. 

She didn’t really care now, either. It was weird, to like John so much and not feel...She knew that they weren’t ever going to be a thing. He looked at her like she was a kid, though there was no way that they weren’t the same age, or around it. There were a few moments where she felt like, maybe. Moments where he looked at her like she was something more. But in those moments, she didn’t care very much about Dreamer either. 

“Yeah,” Clarice says. She likes having him so close, but he had been waiting for her to wake up. He had to want to talk to her about something, “Do you want to do more training?”  
“What?” John said, looking at her again. Dreamer’s finally walked away, and now there’s nobody watching them. Clarice thinks about her dreams again; they’ve never kissed in real life, no matter how real it felt. She could change that, if she wanted to. Everything is so weird, and so different than everything she'd felt before, but maybe that’s because it’s real. He doesn’t seem to have been waiting so that he could tell her something, so maybe he was just worried about her. That seems like something. 

She’s leaning in, and finally going take the chance, but he puts an arm on her shoulder to stop her, and she practically recoils back, until she’s halfway across the left side of the couch. She’s probably blushing, but the house isn’t exactly well lit and maybe he can’t see it. Her jaw is shaking, and she knows that she needs to get the hell out of there.

“Clarice, wait,” He says as she starts to get up, following her up and taking her wrist. “Wait, I need to talk to you about something. Please.”

She sits down, and approximates a certain amount of calm, but she’s itching to run. She should have known that it was wrong; nothing felt right, just weird. She thought actually knowing what it was like to kiss him would be better than constantly thinking about what it would be like to kiss him, but now she’s not even sure of that. Everything about this has just been so fucking confusing that she’s not sure of anything.

“I have to tell you something about Dreamer’s powers,” John says, to start off. “It’s not offensive at all. It’s...Well, she releases this powder, and it makes...She can make people have these memories, of whatever she wants. They feel like...dreams, and---”  
“Why are you telling me this?” Clarice says, but she knows why. Everything starts to click into place, starting with why Dreamer’s called Dreamer at all. She’s not blushing anymore, but she can feel her face getting hot with something else.  
“She...She needed you to make the portal, and you weren’t harnessing your powers with positive thoughts, so she thought that if she gave you something to focus on....”  
Him, she gave Clarice him to think about. Her stomach is rolling, and she wonders if she’s going to vomit. For the past day and a half, she’s been so confused. And worse, in her attempt to make to make it less so, she’s made up this whole fantasy idea, about finally feeling something real, that wasn’t about manipulation, or something using her for something. She’s so pathetic, to not realize that of course it wasn’t real. This is a community of mutants. Thoughts don’t just appear randomly, not when there are so many telepathics. 

“She manipulated my mind?” Clarice says, half a question. John looks pained, filled of guilty. She has a horrible falling sensation at the idea that maybe he had told Dreamer to do it, that he had suggested the memory, but it only lasts a second. He wouldn’t be telling her if that were the case, and he would have told her. She knew before this mess that he was a good leader, if nothing else, and he wouldn’t use her. 

“She did,” He said, his face hard, “I told her not to, but she did anyway. I’m sorry--Clarice!”

She’s already out the door by the time that he finishes his sentence, but it doesn’t matter. She doesn’t care about apologies, not when it wasn’t even him that did it. She knows who did it, and she isn’t going to accept an apology. 

Clarice has never been this angry before. Her first emotion has always been fear. Her instinct has always been run. She’s been scared her entire life, and she isn’t going to run from this. This is unacceptable. She didn’t have her freedom while in prison and prior to that, she didn’t have much of a life. But she always had her mind, which was hers. This? This is wrong, and she isn’t going to accept it. 

But she always had her mind, which was hers. This? This is wrong, and she isn’t going to accept it. 

“Hey, Dreamer!” She says, once she finds where she is. It’s the main room of the house, and practically everyone is either in it, or in eyesight of it. Trader and the dad are one some beds in the corner, with all the other Struckers. Lorna and Marcus are sitting on a couch together, and look away from one another when she shouts.  
She yelled at the other girl because it was important that Dreamer get punched in the face. Well, important to Clarice. She’s not that strong, has never been that way, but she’s motivated, and her first punch to the face nearly makes the other girl fall down. She can hear the commotion coming from around her, but doesn’t care and tackles the other girl while she’s done. Dreamer is fighting back, and she’s definitely stronger than Clarice, but Clarice had the element of surprise, and now she’s on top of the other girl. 

“How-could-you-invade-my-mind?” Clarice says, trying to punch the redhead in the face. The other women grabs at Clarice’s arms, though, and keeps her from following through on any of the blows. “What-kind-of-a-sadistic-asshole-are-you?”

At this point, someone’s pulling her off Dreamer, though not before Clarice grabbed a chunk of her hair. The force of the person pulling does all the work, and Dreamer is dragged for a second before Clarice’s loses her grip. Dreamer screams, satisfyingly, though.

“What the hell, Clarice?” Marcus says, coming up in front of her. Polaris has dropped to her knees, and is helping Dreamer get up. 

“What’s going are, are you alright?” Caitlin says, coming up beside Dreamer. She isn’t hurt at all, not really, and Clarice feels a well of resentment grow in her stomach. Her brain is going to be messed up for who knows how long, and yet she can’t even hurt Dreamer. 

“Clarice, you need to calm down?” John says, in her ear. He must be the one holding her, she realizes, and begins to struggle. He smells so good, and she can remember being held by him, except that it never happened, and finally, he lets her go.

“Tell them!” She says, practically screaming. It’s a little too weak to be a scream; she’s losing some of her angry, as it turns to sadness. She had been happy in the past few days, and now it’s all ruined. She won’t be allowed to stay, now when she attacked one of the leaders of the house. “Tell them what you did!”

John let go of her body, but he put a hand on her shoulder, calm and sure. There’s no force to it, and she can rip herself away, if she wants to. Most of her does want to, wants to get away from him, and the fake memory he reminds her of. But another part of her just wants to get closer, and that’s the part that wins out.

“I-I-I...” Dreamer says, looking guilty, “You needed to save them! They were either going to die, or lead a mob here, and-and-and--”

“What did you do, Sonia?” Lorna asks, looking at her friend, with worry. She’s got green hair, now, though maybe she always had green hair, and Clarice just couldn’t see it because of the dark when they met. She’s only met the other girl once, and then heard a lot about her. “It’s alright,”

“No, it’s not,” John says, and Clarice feels a rush. She hates herself for it, but it isn’t her fault, actually. It’s a memory, from his girlfriend. “It’s not alright, Lorna. This is bad.”

“What happened?” Lorna asks again, calmly. It’s like she hasn’t heard John at all, but it’s beginning to work. Dreamer looks like she’s about to cry, and Clarice wants to scream. Dreamer isn’t the one who’s been violated, Dreamer isn’t the one who’s been a mix of lust and confusion the past day or so. 

Dreamer explains it, looking guilty but sure all the way.The larger group drifts off as they comprehend what has happened. The Struckers are the first to go, walking back to where their father sits. Everyone goes back to minding their own business, and watching out of the corner of their eye. 

“Sonia,” Lorna says in a soft voice. “Sonia, how could you?” She sounds so disappointed that even Clarice can feel it. She’s still angry, but she’s relieved that Dreamer’s confessed. Maybe everyone will stop looking at her like she's a crazy person.

“I just wanted to save you,” Dreamer says.

“Tell them what memory you gave me,” Clarice says, taking a step closer to the other women. John’s hand goes to her wrist, ready to hold her back if necessary, but Clarice isn’t going to attack her again. “Tell them,”

“I don’t think...” Marcus begins to say, but Caride is on a role.

“Tell them about how you gave me a memory of your boyfriend fucking you.” The word echoes through the building, and Clarice is pretty sure that everyone hears it. John drops his hand from her wrist, and Clarice is pretty sure that Caitlin has to force her son’s head away from the drama. But she doesn’t care. In fact, she’s glad of it.

There’s silence for a long time, as nobody knows what to say. Dreamer’s face looks hard as stone, and she doesn’t move any part of her body for a long time. Marcus is looking to the floor, and Clarice feels a moment of guilt that he and Lorna have to be involved with this. Lorna is the first one to talk, eventually.

“Alright, Sonia, in the planning room.” There’s an authority to her voice that Clarice wasn’t expecting. Somewhere between the rebellious sounding girl of the first night they met, and the kind, loving goddess of Marcus’s description, there hadn’t been any room for the person who, along with John, was in charge of this place, “Clarice, if you don’t mind waiting out here, we can talk to you later...”

“I do mind,” Clarice says. “I’m leaving. I don’t want to be here anymore. I’m going to pack my stuff, and then I’m going to leave.” 

“Please, Clarice,” John says, “We need to talk about this, first,”

She isn’t sure if it’s the residual memory, isn’t going to be able to tell if any of her feelings are the residual memory or not for a long time, but she nods, once, jerkily. She doesn’t want to leave, is the worst part. She doesn’t think it’s only because of John, either. She likes it here, likes the people. Even if they look at her like she’s scary. Like now.

**Author's Note:**

> this show has consumed my life, and all i want to do is watch Clarice Fong be alternately doubtful, happy, in love, angsty and then happy again. this is not about that, though. check me out at my tumblr valkylicious.tumblr.com, and talk to me about thunderblink. in case you can't tell from this, i ship it. that was totally serious, this is not super shippy. i mean, it's pretty shippy. also a quick note: if you're confused as to why Clarice is so sure that everyone hates it, it's a characterization of her that ive been thinking about, bc of her visible mutation. i think it would make everyone a little over conscious about what people think of them. it's not super obvious in this


End file.
